For The First Time
by angelisles
Summary: The first time Jane Rizzoli met Maura Isles was an accident but it gave Maura something she thought she'd never find.


"Hey, Jane? Can you do me a favour and go and get some extra paint colours from the supply cupboard?" Jane sighed and nodded her head at her teacher. She didn't even want to take art. She wanted extra gym but they wouldn't let her so it was either this or home ec. She made her way to the back of the classroom, the whole back wall was lined with cupboards with different supplies in them so there weren't any desks until around the middle of the floor. She took the key from the hanger for the cupboard that had paint in it and crouched down to get to the lock. Any average height girl of 15 years old wouldn't need to crouch down but Jane Rizzoli was not of average height. In fact, she was taller than most of the guys in her class.

When she opened the door she almost lost her balance.

"Jesus Christ! What are you doing in there?" She hissed, gripping onto the side of the cupboard to regain balance. A girl, an actual person was sitting inside this cupboard. Jane blinked hard thinking she was probably imagining it. The petite girl seemed to fit perfectly inside this cupboard, she just looked straight up at Jane, meeting her brown eyes with wide hazel ones and whispered.

"Shh, I'm hiding." Jane looked over at the rest of her class, no one seemed to have noticed that she hadn't returned with extra paint.

"Yeah, no shit! Why?" She asked, she'd never seen this girl before but something about the way she was furrowing her brow and not making eye contact and slightly shaking intrigued her. Well, those things and the fact that she'd just found her sitting at the bottom of an art cupboard.

"Uhh… I'm, I…" The girl struggled for words and sighed, not knowing what to say. She looked panicked and Jane instantly felt bad, she reached out and touched the girls arm, she felt and could see the girl almost instantly stop shaking under her touch.

"Okay. It's okay, you don't have to explain right now but… You do go to this school, right? Like you aren't going to jump outta there with like a bomb or something or stab me?" The brunette questioned but let a small smile play on her lips so the other girl wouldn't think she was being too serious, even though she kind of was.

"Well, of course I go to this school. Why would I enter a random building and decide to hide in this particular cupboard with absolutely no reason to do so. How would I even get past the front gates?" She responded abruptly, brushing some stray honey-blonde waves away from her face.

"Alright, jeez. Calm down. Look, you gotta have a name, right? I'm Jane." She offered, changing the subject as the other girl looked and sounded like she was getting pissed.

"I know what your name is, Jane Rizzoli. I've been here for months now. My name is Maura Isles, future Medical Examiner, so what I'm even doing in this class is a complete mystery to me, I don't belong here. I wanted to do extra Biology but they wouldn't let me." Maura sighed and shuffled around in the cupboard, obviously starting to feel uncomfortable.

"You've been in this cupboard for months now?" Jane smiled, gaining a reciprocated smile and a tiny laugh disguised as a cough from Maura Isles. Jane thought about how similar they were but at the same time, how extremely different, and then she thought about how she didn't really know this girl at all but there was something there that made her want to, something about her wide hazel eyes, the rings she kept twisting around on her fingers and her apparent tendency to sit in cupboards in art classrooms that made her want to know more.

"I mean the school. I moved here 3 months ago." Jane raised an eyebrow.

"3 months? I've never seen you here before."

"I didn't want to be seen." Maura shrugged.

"Jane?" She looked over and saw her teacher walking towards them. Jane's eyes snapped back onto Maura's whose eyes were widening by the second and practically screaming 'Help me!'

"Are you struggling, Rizzoli?" He asked and she frantically shook her head.

"Uh, no, no! Here, here's some paint, I will carry the rest over." She panicked, quickly bundling bottles of paint into the teacher's arms.

"Hurry up, Jane. We only have 10 minutes left of class." He said before turning away and walking back to the rest of the class.

Jane heard Maura letting out a sigh of relief and she crouched back down in front of her.

"Hey, do you maybe wanna get out of there now?" She whispered, holding out a hand for Maura to take but she just shook her head and folded her arms.

"Why not?"

"Because."

"Maura."

"Jane."

Jane sighed and rubbed her temples. Why was she so intent on helping this girl? She thought for a second.

"Okay, how about you stay there until the end of class and then I'll come get you?" She suggested and Maura froze for a second, as if deep in thought before meeting Jane's eyes and nodded.

Jane grabbed a few more bottles of paint and closed the cupboard, feeling worried about the strange girl she left behind. Ten minutes felt like an hour and she was feeling increasingly anxious about Maura, she couldn't understand why she felt like this, she doesn't get along with any of the other girls in her class and never has but she had a feeling this one might be different.

"Okay, that's lunch, kids!" The teacher dismissed the class on the bell and everyone filed out, including the teacher. Jane fumbled around with her bag until everyone was gone then made her way back to Maura.

"Hey." Maura smiled faintly, taking Jane's outstretched hand and climbing out.

"Hi." Jane whispered, as if they were still crouching on the floor hiding from the rest of their class.

"So, you wanna tell me what that was about?" She asked, pushing herself up to sit on a desk, Maura sighed and rubbed her eyes.

"You'll think I'm weird." She admitted to the taller girl.

"Well, I think you're pretty weird now, if that helps?" She laughed and Maura rolled her eyes but still not being able to help smiling at this girl who was taking an interest, who'd noticed her.

"People scare me, Jane. Like… Really. I haven't had many good experiences with people, especially in my old school. The other children there would tease me and bully me just because I preferred science over the typical girly, artsy stuff. I thought that if I came here and just stayed in the background then no one would notice me and I wouldn't have to go through all that again." Maura was surprised at herself, both for opening up so quickly to this girl she'd only ever seen playing baseball in gym and admiring how sports and talking to boys came so easily to her and the fact that she was letting herself get so upset in front of her. She wiped a stray tear from her eye and hoped that Jane hadn't noticed.

"Oh, please don't cry." Jane said, reaching out for Maura's hand and pulled her closer. "don't you think literally hiding in a cupboard is a little too far into the background, though?" The two girls laughed and Maura nodded her head in agreement. Somehow, both of their hands had interlocked with each other.

"You know, I honestly wouldn't have been surprised if you would have just gone into the cupboard, gotten what you needed and left without even noticing I was there." Maura admitted, keeping her eyes fixated on the ground.

"Are you kidding? You might be tiny but how could anyone miss those wide, hazel eyes staring up at them." Jane said, her breath catching in her throat as Maura met her eyes with hers.

"You know, I can't get into random cupboards and hide with you, because like," she gestured to her body with her free hand and Maura laughed. "but I can be your friend. I'll make sure you don't need to hide away anymore. I'll punch anyone out you want me to, if anyone ever tries to make fun of you, just point 'em out to me."

"Thank you." Maura whispered and Jane pulled her closer into a hug and as they stood there, Maura realised that for the first time in the 3 months that she'd lived in Boston, it felt like home.


End file.
